Disguised symbolism appears in many Dutch paintings produced in the Renaissance, a time when realism and naturalism became prominent trends and began to replace the abstract, conceptual approach that artists in the Middle Age took to represent religious scenes/figures. In the context where artists sought to depict their living environments faithfully according to observation by sight, disguised symbolism provided a means for them to imbue more complex and lasting meaning into an otherwise everyday (and uninteresting) setting, a mere section in time. The traditional Christian way of allegorical preaching and moralization—that individuals should not indulge the life of worldly pleasures but find transcendence in higher virtues—finds a proper medium in the symbolic potential of everyday objects/entities such as fruits, flowers, candles, mirrors, and animals. Jan van Eyck’s Arnolfini Portrait, for example, incorporates a rich amount of seemingly ornamental/minor details in portraying the interior of the bedroom where the groom and bride stand: casually placed shoes, which likens the floor to a sacred ground and suggests at the sacramental moment of oath-taking; fruits on a cabinet, almost hidden behind the robe the groom is wearing, which allude to fertility; and the backs of two additional figures in the convex mirror, who presumedly serve as witnesses for the wedding, but van Eyck also suggests at his own presence at the scene by incorporating a figure with a red turban—a signature of the artist himself. The inclusion of these commonplace but metaphorical objects envelops the Arnolfini Portrait in a mysterious air, while opening up its narrative to interpretation (e.g., concerning the relationship between the bride and groom, and concerning the religious nature of the wedding depicted on canvas). Many paintings like such present themselves as delicately designed puzzles similar to word games, and they imply the underlying philosophy that there is not one clear objective reality as perceived by the senses, but the everyday is capable of concealing many different stories that take place at other times or an alternate version of what seems to be happening.